Creating positive opportunities for young people

Joining Avanade is a chance to work with software that can help innovative start-ups give something back to the communities we live in.

This was the case with Citizen Schools, a non-profit organisation in the US who use school facilities after hours to create positive opportunities for young people.

They asked us to help them develop an online solution for sharing ideas and information between their staff and volunteers – across 40 schools in seven states. Citizen Schools had identified Microsoft SharePoint Server as the perfect platform, but needed our expertise with Microsoft collaboration technologies to get it up and running. With only eight weeks to deliver, our experience was key. We immediately mapped out what this solution needed to achieve, then built a template for the site. Our close connections with Microsoft added additional value, giving us a unique level of access to their support teams.

The result? The site was launched in time for their staff summer training and has already proved hugely popular. Their intranet is no longer “a wilderness dotted with pockets of activity”. It’s now, like all good educational endeavours, a hub of free flowing ideas and information.